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Cassini Scientist for a Day: the competition for young scientists sets new records

Cassini Scientist for a Day: the competition for young scientists sets new records

New record numbers for the 15th edition of Cassini Scientist for a Day, the international competition launched by NASA and promoted in Europe by the European Space Agency (ESA), open to lower and upper secondary school students. In Italy, 181 students participated in the competition, sending a total of 81 essays to a panel of researchers and experts in science communication.

New record numbers for the 15th edition of Cassini Scientist for a Day, the international competition launched by NASAand promoted in Europe by the European Space Agency (ESA), open to lower and upper secondary school students. In Italy, 181 students participated in the competition, sending a total of 81 essays to a panel of researchers and experts in science communication.

To enter the competition, students had to submit an essay of up to 500 words, explaining which one of the three targets they thought was most interesting for the Cassini mission, choosing from the following: Enceladus’ Plumes, Titan's Lakes or the hexagonal storm at Saturn’s North Pole.

The winners for the first target, Enceladus’ Plumes, are: Alessia Francini from Viareggio, Elisa Gubiani and Giulia Piccoli from San Daniele del Friuli, and Davide Stajano from Latina. The winners for the second target are: Alessia Bucci, Alessia Oliva and Giulia Malpagantifrom Prato, Olivia Ghezzi from Prato, and Thomas Gigante from Latina. The winners for the third target are: Derick Augusto Nicoletta from Baronissi, near Salerno, Emanuele Masotti from San Daniele del Friuli, and Emanuele Nasini from Civitanova Marche.

On June 12nd 2019, in La Laguna (Tenerife, Spain) Prof. Nichi D’Amico, President of the Italian National Institute for Astrophysics (INAF), and Prof. Rafael Rebolo Lopez, Director of the Instituto de Astrofisica de Canaries, signed a Record of Understanding to enter a detailed negotiation on a technical and programmatic basis aimed to install and operate the ASTRI Mini-Array at the Observatorio del Teide

In a study appearing today on The Astrophysical Journal, an INAF-lead team of researchers explored whether the anomalous features in the dust and gas distributions of HD 163296's disk revealed by ALMA's observations could arise from the interaction of the giant planets with a component of the disk previously unaccounted for: the planetesimals